Turkey Convicts Assassins Working For Iranian Intelligence

The Supreme Accounting Office has released a report covering the period March 21- May 20 that shows except tax revenues, all other major sources of income grossly underperformed, which local media said was a serious warning for the government and the economy.

The government’s revenues from taxes, oil exports, customs duties, etc. totaled 880 trillion rials or about $3.5 billion (average free market exchange rate) in the 60-day period. This was just 37 percent of the projected budget revenues. However, it was forced to spend almost $5 billion in the same period. This was also about half of what the government had to spend, appropriating money to various ministries and provinces.

But the most notable number in the report is how little oil income was collected. While 79 percent of tax revenues were realized, only 15 percent of oil export income entered government coffers.

This is despite constant claims by Iranian officials that oil exports have increases by 40 percent in the past 12 months, which to a large extent correspond with what tanker traffic monitoring companies around the world have confirmed.

Iran’s budget was set with the expectation of 1.2 million barrels of oil exports per day. The consensus among observers is that Iran has shipped anywhere between 750,000 to close to a million barrels a day, while prices have spiked since the budget was approved. Therefore, oil export income should be close to what was set in the budget.

There could be a few explanations for the huge financial discrepancy mentioned in the Supreme Accounting Office report.

One possibility is that Iran is not receiving cash for the oil exports that largely end up in China. Many have mentioned barter trade, whereby Iran receives goods in lieu of the oil sent to China. The other possibility is that Beijing is keeping the money for now, given United States’ banking sanctions on Iran.

However, oil minister Javad Owji claimed on July 4 that Iran is receiving 80 of oil proceeds in cash and only 20 percent in barter. If this is true, then one can wonder where the money is and how it happened that the government got only 15 percent of what it expected.

This brings us to the second possibility. Cash collected from oil exports does not end up in government coffers and instead it is distributed to ‘revolutionary’ entities in Iran and abroad whose existence and operations are deemed essential for the regime, which is controlled not by parliament or presidential administrations, but by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

It has always been known that the official government budget pertains to routine operations, such as civilian ministries and the large public-sector industrial companies, banks, etc.

The Revolutionary Guard, for example, has a nominal public budget appropriated by parliament, which is around $4-5 billion, but according to some estimates it spends at least $17 billion. The same is about secret expenditures to support military, intelligence and influence operations in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere.

A senior Saudi official said on Thursday that the kingdom may invite an Israeli representative for an unprecedented trilateral meeting, a possible sign that Riyadh may be willing to publicly acknowledge its warming, under-the-table ties with Israel.

Citing one of crown prince Mohammed bin Salman's advisors, the online outlet for the Israeli Yedioth Ahronot newspaper, Ynet, said the move is contingent upon the success of Biden's trip to the Middle East, especially the results of his visit to Riyadh. 

The option of inviting a senior Israeli figure to join Biden's visit to Saudi Arabia was discussed before as part of the American-Saudi dialogue, but the chances of this scenario becoming reality seemed very slim. Jerusalem believes such a summit will serve the opportunity to secure "small-medium normalization measures" with Riyadh.

The news came as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a phone call with new Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid both to congratulate him on assuming the role and express US unwavering commitment to their partnership.

The US and Israel are seeking to lay the groundwork for a security alliance with Arab states that would use Israeli technology to connect their air defense systems to combat Iranian drone and missile threats, Reuters quoted sources familiar with the plan earlier in the day. 

In the official complaint filed in January with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice and recently obtained by Iran International, the airline requested $750 million in compensation for the passengers and crew and $250 million in damages. 

“The plaintiff claims damages for the loss of life and baggage of passengers and crew and derivative claims of surviving family members in the amount of $750 million and damages for and arising from the loss of its aircraft in the amount of $250 million,” the document read. 

In June, Canada announced that it has notified Iran of Ontario's Superior Court of Justice’s ruling that IRGC’s downing of the plane was intentional. In the case -- titled Zarei et al vs Islamic Republic of Iran et al – some family members filed a civil lawsuit against Iran and senior officials they believe were to blame for the incident.

The airliner was shot down by two air-defense missiles fired by the IRGC as it took off from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport. Hours earlier, the IRGC had fired more than a dozen missiles at Iraqi bases hosting US troops in retaliation for the killing of the IRGC Qods Force Commander Ghasem Soleimani who was targeted by a US drone strike just five days earlier. All 176 passengers and crew, including 63 Canadians and 10 from Sweden, as well as 82 Iranian citizens on the plane died in the disaster.

According to a video sent to Iran International, anti-riot forces are seen attacking the workers of the Sungun (Soungoun) copper mine complex, located in Varzaqan (Varzaghan) county in province of East Azarbaijan, who have been on strike for at least three days demanding better work conditions and salaries. 

More than 1,200 workers of the mine -- the largest open-cast copper mine in Iran -- spent the last three nights inside their tents or cars at the site of the mining complex. 

During the past few days several of the copper mine workers were arrested by security forces but the clampdown had not been so ferocious until Thursday. 

Iran’s runaway inflation, currently at an annual rate of 55 percent, has impoverished a vast majority of the population and is seen as the result of a nuclear program that has brought on international and US sanctions for the past 15 years, crippling the economy.

With food prices rising faster after four years of United States’ ‘maximum pressure’ sanctions, Iranian workers and retirees have been holding regular protests or strikes to demand higher salaries. Last month, Iran’s currency fell to a historic low of 333,000 rials to the US dollar in June.

During the past weeks, widespread protests by workers,shop owners, and teachers protesting against poverty, inflation, and low wages, have been met with heavy-handed crackdown and numerous arrests by the security forces.

The Worldwide Baha’i Community announced in a recent statement that at least 44 Baha'is were summoned to court, detained, put on trial or given prison sentences in June. 

Earlier in June, Radio Farda reported that 26 followers of the Baha'i faith, all of whom residing in the city of Shiraz in the southwestern province of Fars, were sentenced to 2-5 year in prison on charges of "conspiracy to disrupt internal and external security." The verdicts were issued on June 8 by a branch of the city’s Revolutionary Court.

The 1979 constitution of the Islamic Republic recognizes only Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Zoroastrianism. Baha'ism − established as a new religion in Iran in 1863 by Baha'ullah, who claimed to be a prophet following Jesus and Muhammad − has always been deemed heretical by the Shia establishment and subject to intermittent bouts of political persecution.

Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has on several occasions called the Baha'i faith a cult and in a religious fatwa in 2018 forbade contact, including business dealings, with followers of the faith.

Baha'is, who number around 300,000 in Iran, say their rights are systematically violated, that they are often harassed, forced to leave their homes and businesses, and are deprived of government job and university education. There are Baha’i communities in many countries worldwide but there is no reliable figure about the total number of followers.